H/T Drudge
Police say a passenger set a taxicab on fire during a robbery attempt and died in the blaze. Bowie (Prince George's County, MD) Police say around 4:50 Friday afternoon, a detective spotted the cab on fire. The driver, a seven year veteran of the taxi business, told officers he had picked up a male fare from the Largo metro station and brought him to the 4200 Block of Northview Drive.
Before that, he says, there were warning signs. "He's drinking the spirit," the driver said. "Alcohol." The victim says the passenger, drinking and smoking in the back seat, first hedged and then became angered about a $34 fare. The driver explained the passenger then grabbed him from behind in a headlock, hissing 'Give me your money', and then deliberately set the cab on fire after dousing the back seat area with alcohol. Whatta maroon. If he'd been carrying a gun, he'd have probably put a bullet through his own femoral artery while pulling it out of his pocket and the cabby would only be out a few packages of paper towels and a case of Formula 409...
"He is starting to put down the spirit, and he lit it... the liquor," recalled the driver. The driver with his hair in flames escaped the vehicle, but the passenger did not. One officer told the driver that rubber seals in the car's doors had melted, possibly trapping the would-be robber inside and providing irrefutable proof of God's sometimes twisted sense of humor.
Witnesses came to the driver's aid, helping to put out the flames on his head. Firefighters found the passenger inside dead. His body was burned beyond recognition. Authorities have not yet identified the passenger.
Posted by: Ricky bin Ricardo (Abu Babaloo) ||
08/19/2012
15:41 ||
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#1
...Lawsuit against the taxicab driver and company from the Awardee's family in three, two, one...
Mike
Posted by: Mike Kozlowski ||
08/19/2012 17:06
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Syrian rebels boasted at the weekend that British and German intelligence services are increasingly involved in covert operations to help the rebels topple President Bashar al-Assad.
German and British spies are apparently passing on information about Syrian troop movements to the rebels.
"We can be proud of the significant contribution we are making to the fall of the Assad regime," an official from Germany's BND foreign intelligence service told German newspaper Bild am Sonntag.
The paper said that German spies were stationed off the Syrian coast and also active at a Nato base in Turkey, whose government is sheltering Free Syrian Army rebels.
Britain's Sunday Times also said that British intelligence was helping rebels launch successful attacks on government forces with information gathered from listening posts in nearby Cyprus.
And just two days after his appointment, new UN peace envoy Lakhdar Brahimi came under fire from the rebels for reportedly refusing to say whether President Assad should stand down.
The rebels lashed out at the new envoy, branding his view that it was too soon for him to call for Mr Assad to go "unacceptable."
#2
Fighting AQ in Afghanistan, assisting AQ in Syria. Fails the test, but very British.
British Army are in Cyprus to support the conflict in Afghanistan. The army has a reserve battalion ready to be deployed in 48 hrs notice who are the 2 Royal Anglians during Op Herrick 13-14. The airbase. RAF Akrotiri, is a base to 'decompress' the soldiers back from Afghan before they go back to UK. It is a strategic point of logistics between Afghan and UK both soldiers and equipment. The army is also there to protect the listening posts which catches radio frequencies and can listen in like a spying device but on a large scale. They look like large nets and are suspended by two large poles.
AFTER months of military leaders' attempts to curb killings of coalition troops by the Afghan forces serving beside them, US general John Allen, the top commander in Afghanistan, called an urgent meeting of his generals last week to address the rising death toll after the killing of six US Marines trainers on August 10.
In a series of recent steps, the military decreed that US and NATO service members should always carry a loaded magazine in their weapons. Another initiative is a program dubbed ''Guardian Angel'' that calls for one or two soldiers to monitor the Afghans during every mission or meeting, officials say.
The ''angels'', whose identities are not disclosed to the Afghans, must be prepared to fire on anyone who tries to kill a coalition service member.
The military has also analysed the so-called ''green on blue'' attacks, discovering that only a handful have clearly been due to Taliban activity - a worrying development that suggests a malaise within the Afghan forces that raises the risk that personal rivalries and cultural clashes could complicate the NATO training program.
The ''insider attacks'' come at a politically delicate time, just months before a US presidential election and amid increasingly vocal complaints from parents of dead marines and soldiers that could diminish support among Americans for what is already an unpopular war.
In the 48 hours after General Allen's emergency session, there were two more such attacks. Those assaults left two Special Forces trainers dead and two other US soldiers wounded.
#1
How about you have a "friendly fire accident" with the village the shooter came from? I guarantee, a couple of such "accidents" will end this sort of attacks.
#3
I expect to see the good General called back to DC or 'reassigned' or some other demotion when the next attempt occurs and our guys shoot the 'friendly' Afghans. You don't really expect Bambi and his minions (including the current bobbleheaded SecDec Pointsetta) to allow this type of behaviour, do you?
And oh yeah, expect the GIs to be either quckly arrested of shot in the 'crossfire.'
(Rooters) - WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange berated the United States on Sunday from the balcony of the Ecuadorean embassy where he has sought refuge from arrest, challenging President Barack Obama This is a teachable moment... to end what he called a witch-hunt against his whistle-blowing website. Rooters, if anyone, should know that one man's whistle-blower is another man's Quisling. But we never hear much about Quisling from Rooters, do we?
Speaking from within the London mission to avoid being placed in long-term storage Drop the rosco and step away witcher hands up! by British police who want to extradite him to Sweden for questioning over diddling interns rape allegations, Assange said the United States was fighting a war against outlets like WikiLeaks.
Pitching himself alongside Russian punk band Pussy Riot ... who at least can sing, kinda... sorta... and since Saddam and Muammar are both moulderin' in the grave...
and the New York Times ...which still proudly displays Walter Duranty's Pulitzer prize... newspaper, Assange said the United States risked shunting the world into an era of journalistic oppression. He did not mention the rape allegations.
Posted by: Fred ||
08/19/2012
11:32 ||
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If the US was 1/3 as evil as Julian pretends, he would have had an unfortunate accident long ago. Go piss off the Russians or the Islamists.
#2
Since he will be arrested if he leaves the Ecuadorian embassy, he can't go to Ecuador. He could, in theory, spend the rest of his miserable life in the embassy.
Sort of reminds me of the story of Cardinal Mindszenty of Hungary who spent 15 years in the US embassy. Except, of course, that Cardinal Mindszenty actually was a hero - he had been imprisoned and tortured by the communists. Unlike Julian, who is merely a legend in his own mind.
Posted by: Rambler in Virginia ||
08/19/2012 12:31
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#3
I hope he has the "all Ecuadorian" cable TV package to keep his mind stimulated.
#7
There is a BIG difference between standing on a balcony at an embassy and standing on a mountain in Ecuador. One is safe, and the other gives the illusion of safety. Maybe Assange should contemplate that fine distinction. :-)
#8
This is really fascinating. This guy is such a maroon. Each step along the way gets closer and closer to exposing his (probably) Chinese handlers. So far, they have been perfect in enabling this little man without showing their hands.
Unless he does something really foolish, he will probably outlive the current Government of Ecuador at which point he will be kicked out and then the game will continue in Sweden.
#7
intentionally limiting crowd size at their events because of security and cost. Waaaahhhhaaaaaaa! Cost? When did the Obamas ever worry about costs. Security? They have the best money can buy anyplace in the world. I haven't seen the Greek columns lately. I guess the symbolism might not sell well since the Greek economy is in the dumper.
#12
UG3818: i read that art from the Drudge link. Too bad the libtards won't; after all it DID run 4 pages long and I am sure their lips would dry out trying to read something that long....
#1
Its a harbinger of a nationwide investment boom spreading from the oil fields of North Dakota and the Marcellus gas shale in Pennsylvania to power plants in California and chemical refiners in Texas.
So does the Democratic Party, and that's the problem. If the numbers we're seeing are even remotely close to right, then there really IS enough fossil fuel out there to hold us for a few centuries yet...and that means the Dems are pretty much wrong on their energy policies, which are in turn the cornerstone/justification for a great deal of their economic policies. They ever flat out admit that, they're dead - people want to be happy and prosperous and in control of their own futures, not freezing in the dark while our masters and betters decide what's good for us...and that much fossil fuel out there means the Dems can't control us.
Not that they won't try, of course.
Mike
Posted by: Mike Kozlowski ||
08/19/2012 11:13
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Average tax on a gallon of gas is 48.1 cents per gallon. Average profit Exxon makes is only 2 cents per gallon.
When Hillary Clinton heard about Exxon profit, her response was, "I want that."
The issue with the communist party is not if we have enough energy, it is that we the private sector process it, and they are doing everything they can to keep us away from it until they can completely control it. That is the plan for the major sectors of the less and less free market economy of the U.S..
#4
Mad Eye, Exxon makes a good deal more profit than that - the 2 cents is the profit from the Refining & Marketing part of the business. They make most profit these days from Production - probably something like 30 cents per eventual gallon of gas. When oil prices collapse though, they lose money on production, but probably still makes a few cents at the pump.
I think their current tactic is to ban coal because of "global warming" and then use up the natural gas that could replace imported oil in replacing the domestically produced coal instead.
#6
A farmer or lease holder used to get one eighth of one percent royalty on crude oil production. May be a bit different today. The US Gummit is the lease holder for all off-shore drilling as I recall. Wonder if anyone is keeping track of those royalty payments?
#8
I would not be surprised at some sort of plan by government to take over the domestic energy production under the guise of using the money to pay down the debt.
#9
heh. "We aren't asking you to pay more taxes, but fuel and heating oil is now $15+/gallon."
Posted by: Frank G ||
08/19/2012 15:13
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Despite mucho MSM-Net Artics both for + against "Peak Oil", "Biotic Oil", + "Shale Oil, etc. I still don't see enuff of a common consensus from Govts-Perts as to reliability.
"SIRIUS" + SOLAR STORMS EVENTS ASIDE, FOR ALL WE KNOW, THIS DRIVE TO INVEST IN SHALE OIL EXISTS BECAUSE TRADITIONAL "DEEP" RESERVOIRS ARE EXHAUSTED. Incidentally, iff true it makes it imoerative for the ongoing natural oil leaks in the Gulf of Mexico to be studies + capped.
The carnage in Afghanistan continued unabated on a major Muslim holiday on Sunday, as attackers killed two pairs of brothers with links to the government and three NATO service members.
The targeted killings are part of a spate of similar attacks on those associated with the government, further complicating efforts by international forces in country to hand over security responsibility to Afghans as foreign combat troops withdraw.
In the first attack, a bomb hidden in a cemetery in the southern province of Helmand killed a police chief and his brother who were visiting a family grave for the Eid al-Fitr holiday.
Seven of the men's family members were wounded in the early-morning blast in the provincial capital of Lashkar Gah, said Helmand Deputy Police Chief Ghulam Rabbani.
No one immediately claimed responsibility, but the attack was consistent with the Taliban's strategy to target authorities and others who align themselves with the government or international forces.
The two men were brothers of a lawmaker for Helmand province, Abdulwadood Popal, who was not at the cemetery at the time of the blast. The family was visiting the grave after morning prayers for the holiday, which ends the month-long Ramadan fasting period.
Then in Farah province in the west, gunmen on a motorcycle opened fire on the car of an intelligence service official as he was driving home from a family visit, killing him and his brother who worked for the customs service.
Vice-presidential picks are always judged by their effect on the coming election. They rarely have any. They havent had a decisive influence since Lyndon Johnson carried Texas for John Kennedy in 1960.
If Mitt Romney and Ryan can successfully counterattack Mediscare, the Ryan effect becomes a major plus. Because:
(a) Ryan nationalizes the election and makes it ideological, reprising the 2010 dynamic that delivered a shellacking to the Democrats.
(b) If the conversation is about big issues, Obama cannot hide from his dismal economic record and complete failure of vision. In Obamas own on-camera commercial the choice . . . couldnt be bigger whats his big idea? A 4.6-point increase in the marginal tax rate of 2 percent of the population.
For a country with stagnant growth, ruinous debt and structural problems crying out for major entitlement and tax reform? Its a joke.
(c) Image. Ryan, fresh and 42, brings youth, energy and vitality the very qualities Obama projected in 2008 and has by now depleted. From transcendence to the political gutter in under four years. A new Olympic record.
And while Romney is the present, Ryan is the future. Romneys fate will be determined on Nov. 6. Ryans presence, assuming he acquits himself well in the campaign, will extend for decades. If Ryan does it well, win or lose in 2012, he becomes a dominant national force. Mild and moderate Mitt Romney will have shaped the conservative future for years to come.
The cunning of history. Or if you prefer, its sheer capriciousness. Krauthammer - RTWT
Posted by: Bobby ||
08/19/2012
08:52 ||
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Vice-presidential picks are always judged by their effect on the coming election.They rarely have any
Try telling that to the SCAM (state controlled American media) according to them Palin trashed McCains chances. She was the only reason to vote for him given his complete ineptness.
#2
I'm hoping for a slam bam a$$-kicking this November by the pubs. I will enjoy the MSM running around with their long faces down around their jockey shorts. I will enjoy seeing how the state controlled media try to spin it.
#5
If the conversation is about big issues, Obama cannot hide from his dismal economic record and complete failure of vision. (Emphasis mine - RbR)
That's a point on which I have to respectfully disagree with The Hammer. Ogabe's vision isn't a failure at all - his intention all along was to weaken and Balkanize the country to the maximum degree possible.
Posted by: Ricky bin Ricardo (Abu Babaloo) ||
08/19/2012 14:00
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URGENT: NEWSWEEK COVER THIS WEEK, JUST RELEASED TODAY, TELLS OBAMA TO GET LOST. MSM IS TURNING ON OBAMA.
I posted a link for tomorrow Rantburg edition. If MSM turns on Obama, the Democratic Convention will be the decision point for the Dems.
A generation has passed since the 1992 Earth Summit in Rio, which begat other conferences and protocols (e.g., Kyoto). And, by now, apocalypse fatigue -- boredom from being repeatedly told the end is nigh.
This began two generations ago, in 1972, when we were warned (by computer models developed at MIT) that we were doomed. We were supposed to be pretty much extinct by now, or at least miserable. We are neither. So, what went wrong? People are smarter greedier than the experts think they are.
The modelers examined 19 commodities and said that 12 would be gone long before now -- aluminum, copper, gold, lead, mercury, molybdenum, natural gas, oil, silver, tin, tungsten and zinc. Lomborg says:
Technological innovations have replaced mercury in batteries, dental fillings and thermometers; mercury consumption is down 98 percent, and its price was down 90 percent by 2000. Since 1970, when gold reserves were estimated at 10,980 tons, 81,410 tons have been mined, and estimated reserves are 51,000 tons.
Since 1970, when known reserves of copper were 280 million tons, about 400 million tons have been produced globally, and reserves are estimated at almost 700 million tons. Aluminum consumption has increased 16-fold since 1950, the world has consumed four times the 1950 known reserves, and known reserves could sustain current consumption for 177 years. Potential U.S. gas resources have doubled in the past six years. And so on.
The modelers missed something -- human ingenuity in discovering, extracting and innovating. Which did not just appear after 1972.
Forty years after "The Limits to Growth" imparted momentum to environmentalism, that impulse now is often reduced to children indoctrinated to "reduce, reuse, and recycle." Lomborg calls recycling "a feel-good gesture that provides little environmental benefit at a significant cost." He says that "we pay tribute to the pagan god of token environmentalism by spending countless hours sorting, storing and collecting used paper, which, when combined with government subsidies, yields slightly lower-quality paper in order to secure a resource" -- forests -- "that was never threatened in the first place." I was surprised to find making old newspapers into cereal-box cardboard in Dallas, Texas started in 1897. Now do you know why it is gray?
In 1980, economist Julian Simon made a wager in the form of a complex futures contract. He bet Paul Ehrlich (whose 1968 book "The Population Bomb" predicted that "hundreds of millions of people" would starve to death in the 1970s as population growth swamped agricultural production) that by 1990 the price of any five commodities Ehrlich and his advisers picked would be lower than in 1980.
Ehrlich's group picked five metals. All were cheaper in 1990. Whadda maroon! But wait, there's more!
The bet cost Ehrlich $576.07. But that year he was awarded a $345,000 MacArthur Foundation "genius" grant and half of the $240,000 Crafoord Prize for ecological virtue. One of Ehrlich's advisers, John Holdren, is Barack Obama's science adviser.
Posted by: Bobby ||
08/19/2012
07:43 ||
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Yes, but we're so modern, hip, and sophisticated, that simple homilies that address well known human behavior are only for the unwashed, fly over, bible thumping, gun toting rubes.
The Malthusians are ever with us. My sister as a late teen went on a great rant to my father about all the typical '60s crap how the middle class suburbia was so terrible.
He simply quoted some of the same type of thing from the '20s and said how people always wanted to a) be scared and b) think themselves the saviors of man kind. SSDD.
#4
we're so modern, hip, and sophisticated, that simple homilies that address well known human behavior are only for the unwashed, fly over, bible thumping, gun toting rubes.
#6
re No 5; Yes, leftist politics has a long history of fatal results for non-believers (and some believers). And they have taken over the environmental doom thing as well.
#7
The modelers missed something -- human ingenuity...
An important factor, but it was more than that. Being interested in apocalypses and computer modeling, I actually read the Club of Rome report. One intriguing bit was that after predicting doom, they ran the models with different parameters looking for a way to save humanity. No dice. Everything they tried ran to the same outcome. This suggested either our fate was sealed (apparently not!) OR that the model was in an attractor basin and basically 'stuck' on a particular outcome.
The map is not the territory, the model is not the thing.
Also, I'd like to nominate Paul Erlich for the Nobel Prize for Being Wrong About Everything. He has sold a lot of books, though.
#8
So well put P2K, dismissing the wisdom of the past because they didn't have our technology is foolish. Most core insights into human behavior and organization are not new....and dismissing the wisdom of the past is often a huge mistake, witness the education debacle for example.
#9
Conceptually the left cannot believe capitalism can solve the environmental issues; while trying to leverage the environmental issue as reasons to destroy capitalism.
Their goals and facts get in the way of their agenda.
#10
I too read the CoR report. As a computer geek with a Poli Sci degree I agree with Steve S.
That model was as bogus as the models relied upon by the gerbil worming fanatics. Aside from the logical fallacies modeling always obeys the first law of computers...garbage in, garbage out.
It's very easy to play with the data to get the results you want.
These people don't care about the environment or the population, they only care about power; how to get it and how to keep it. Doomsaying is just one of their tools.
Also, I'd like to nominate Paul Erlich for the Nobel Prize for Being Wrong About Everything. He has sold a lot of books, though.
To my way of seeing things, someone like Ehrlich should be tried and hanged for treason.
Of course, I'm just a neanderthal, according to the beautiful people.
Posted by: no mo uro ||
08/19/2012 13:18
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#12
For all the people who believe that the problem with the world is there are too many people: Why are you still alive? If you truly believe that there are too many people, why haven't you committed suicide to help the problem?
The real problem for people who believe that there are too many people is that there are too many OTHER people. They of course think that they will be among the few survivors.
Posted by: Rambler in Virginia ||
08/19/2012 13:42
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#13
RiV, why haven't you committed suicide to help the problem?
Now wait a minute here. First they should all become mass murderers, after all, why kill the one when you can kill the many?
#15
if a certain predictor class has been wrong every single time in the last 40 years and their current predictions are based on models that don't even predict the present with any accuracy given data of the past then rationality would reject them out of hand. seriously folks, chicken poop bingo gives a better probability of accuracy than these 'experts' have.
Posted by: abu do you love ||
08/19/2012 16:25
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#16
Without doom and death the Aasvoëls (vultures) have no meat.
WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange is set to break months of silence Sunday from Ecuador's Embassy in Britain, where he fled to avoid extradition to Sweden.
London police officers stood guard outside the embassy ahead of the expected appearance, while a dozen Assange supporters showed up. Both groups were outnumbered by the media and by curious shoppers from the upscale stores in the area.
Assange is scheduled to speak Sunday afternoon from the embassy in London, where he has been living, effectively confined to the diplomatic mission in a posh London neighborhood near Hyde Park.
His statement comes as foreign ministers from various South American countries gather in Ecuador to discuss his fate.
The dispute between London and Ecuador broke out when the British Foreign Office cited a little known law that could temporarily suspend the embassy's diplomatic protection and allow authorities to enter and arrest Assange. Ecuador's president Rafael Correa on Saturday called Britain's behavior toward Ecuador "intolerable" and "unacceptable."
During his weekly address, Correa said, "Who do they think they're dealing with? They don't realize Latin America is free and sovereign. We won't tolerate interference, colonialism of any kind."
The president said Ecuador had sought, but did not receive, a guarantee that Assange would not be extradited to a third country.
Assange's supporters fear if he is extradited to Sweden, he could be sent to the United States next. Sweden angrily rejected the allegation on Thursday.
"Sweden does not extradite individuals who risk facing the death penalty," the Foreign Ministry said after Ecuador granted Assange asylum.
I'm thinking it sounds a LOT like Julie has figured out that he's going to be in that embassy for a long, long time...or until the Ecuadorian government gets tired of tweaking the Brits. As far as his other 'demands'...lemme know how that works out, mmmmmmmmmkay?
Mike
Posted by: Mike Kozlowski ||
08/19/2012 10:58
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#2
I understand that he is an arrogant abusive asshole. Hope they enjoy his company
Posted by: Frank G ||
08/19/2012 11:09
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#3
For a guy sleeping on the sofa, he sure does have a lot of demands... he really needs to take a seminar on "Negoitating from Strength" that I see advertised in the in flight magazines.
If I were Julian I would be more concerned with the "girl with the Dragon tatoo" waiting for him in Sweden than BO- Heck, POTUS would probably ask him to address the White House Leak Team for a motivational talk.
#2
Agreed something got rost in translation-
However when I went to Japan a few years back I spent a half an hour watching a "pickling shop" open for business for the day and was amased at the number of ingredients that were being pickled in this mom and pop store. As with most things Japanese, very detail oriented and specific.
Maybe it is our definition of associating cucumber pickles with the picling process as a whole is a bit narrow.
The government on Saturday said the bulk SMSes and MMSes that triggered panic among the northeastern people had been traced to Pakistan and a protest would be lodged with Islamabad.
Or, the other way around, as the WaPo puts it...
Are taxes a form of charitable donation?
Republican presidential challenger Mitt Romney seemed to suggest that he might think so last week, when he responded to questions about how much he pays in taxes by suggesting that people should take into account his total contributions to the government and charities.
The comment was a quick one -- a by-golly insistence that despite paying a relatively low tax rate on his vast income, the millions he has given to charity show that he's not a greedy guy. What's wrong with greedy? There are, after all, just two kinds of people - greedy ones and liars.
But experts who research public attitudes on philanthropy on both sides of the political spectrum said it was an inadvertently revealing moment, a brief window into the deep philosophical differences between how liberals and conservatives view government and society. Which is why I interrupt your Sunday morning.
"Taxes are a form a of charity," said Michael Tanner, a scholar at the Cato Institute who has studied philanthropy, explaining the conservative viewpoint. "If we think of the point of taxes, it's not to be punitive. We tax people because there's some use, some public good, for which they're needed."
He added that one reason a conservative such as Romney aims to push tax rates down is a fundamental belief that individuals make better choices about what society needs than government does: "A conservative might say, 'I know of something in my local community where my dollars might serve a better purpose.' " My taxes don't seem to filter down to my local church, which offers on-the-spot assistance to local needy families.
The flip side of the argument, the liberal side, is that the point of government is to provide a way for citizens to decide together what society needs and to get those things done. Like interstate highways, the Post Office, and - dare I say - national defense.
"This is really the fundamental disagreement," said Garrett Gruener, the founder of Ask.com, who advocates higher taxes for himself and other ultra-wealthy individuals as part of the group Patriotic Millionaires for Fiscal Strength. Nothing is stopping him from writing a check to the Feds...
"Democracy is not a charity. It's an enterprise of all Americans to accomplish things that we democratically decide are important," he said. "Charity is something I do on my own, and I don't expect others to have the same priorities I do." Precisely. That does not equate to more taxes being a good thing.
Romney is one of the wealthiest Americans ever to represent a major party in a presidential race, and his personal finances have been under a political microscope. Democrats argue that his effective tax rate -- 13.9 percent in 2010 -- is an illustration of federal policies that favor the wealthy, making breaks available to those who can pay accountants to find them and taxing investment income at a lower rate than wages. Yeah! Just who makes those tax breaks anyways? Congress? Really?
"I'm proud of the taxes I pay. My taxes, plus my charitable contributions, this year, 2011, will be about 40 percent," he said in January during a debate among Republican presidential candidates in Florida.
On their 2010 tax return, Romney and his wife, Ann, reported giving nearly $3 million to charity, 13.8 percent of their total $21.7 million income. According to the Romney campaign, the couple gave more than $7 million in 2010 and 2011.
That level of giving is far beyond the contributions of most Americans. According to research by the Center on Philanthropy at Indiana University and the Giving USA Foundation, Americans gave about 1.9 percent of disposable personal income to charity in each of the past three years.
It is also more than given by many leading political figures.
According to their 2011 tax return, President Obama and first lady Michelle Obama paid an effective tax rate of 20.5 percent and gave to charity 22 percent of their adjusted gross income of $789,674. But their rate of giving has varied significantly, as has their income. Their 2005 return, for instance, showed them giving 4.6 percent of $1.66 million. In 2003, they gave 1.4 percent of $238,00; in 2004, they contributed 1.2 percent of $207,000. The closer to the election, the more generous they become.
Vice President Plugs Biden and his wife, Jill, gave 1.4 percent of their adjusted income to charity in 2010 and 1.5 percent in 2011. According to tax returns released Friday, the newly chosen Republican vice presidential candidate Paul Ryan and his wife, Janna, gave 1.2 percent of their gross adjusted income to charity in 2010, a figure that jumped to 4 percent in 2011.
According to a calculator developed by Peter Singer, a professor at Princeton University's Center for Human Values, ...and a thorough rabble-rouser who is frequently cited for having all the right opinions...
Romney should have given at least $6 million of his income in 2010. Singer -- who says Americans at all income levels other than himself should forgo more luxuries to help the global poor -- termed Romney's contributions "not all that impressive, given how much he has." I wonder if this guy is a democrat? He seems to like telling other people what they should do.
Posted by: Bobby ||
08/19/2012
07:19 ||
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#1
Charity is different from paying taxes.
But regardless of how you look at it, conservatives are likelier to tithe and to donate to charities than liberals.
Posted by: American Delight ||
08/19/2012 8:19
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#2
It used to be that charities usually don't have the coercive power of government and punishment to directly extract resources from others. However, now days, too many charities use their 'special interest' standing to employ agents within government to get a resource funding stream.
#7
Charity is often more effective than the bureaucrats results with the extorted wealth.
Even more effective for society is just spending it on what you need.
I love when statists get into this territory and cite Christian charity as some sort of related concept in order to somehow shame fiscal conservatives. I don't think Jesus would want folks coerced into giving charity at the point of a Roman spear.
#9
Romney is one of the wealthiest Americans ever to represent a major party in a presidential race, and his personal finances have been under a political microscope.
Kerry and his wife are wealthier but for some strange reason this never came up when he was running .....
#10
Romney is one of the wealthiest Americans ever to represent a major party in a presidential race, and his personal finances have been under a political microscope.
How wealthy were the Roosevelt boys in today's dollars? Or that incorrigible tomcat John F. Kennedy? Presumably that major party bracket was meant to discount Ross Perot and Donald Trump...
#11
tw, remember that the Republicans are the party of the rich. So when a rich Republican (but I repeat myself) runs for office, his finances are a legitimate source of news information. However, when a rich Democrat (warning, oxymoron alert) runs for office, he/she obviously got rich through legitimate means (like Harry Reid?), so the press has no interest.
/sarcasm, as if you couldn't tell
Posted by: Rambler in Virginia ||
08/19/2012 22:21
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Six policemen were killed in the Russian Caucasus region of Ingushetia in a suicide bombing at the funeral of their colleague, Russia's Investigative Committee has said.
The committee, which investigates major killings, said, "In a private house where the funeral was taking place for a neighbourhood policeman, a suicide bomber triggered an explosive device on his body. As a result of the explosion, according to preliminary information, seven people died including the suicide bomber, and there are also wounded whose number is being clarified."
Akhmed Kotiyev, secretary of the regional security council, said that 11 people were injured in the attack.
Ingushetia's leader, Yunus-Bek Yevkurov, said, "According to preliminary information it was carried out by a terrorist suicide bomber," calling the attack "monstrous".
He said a severed head found at the scene of the blast was believed to be that of the suicide bomber.
Yevkurov said, "We are working on finding out whose head is lying at the scene of the explosion, and we will establish the identity of the bandit."
The funeral was for a fellow officer killed in a shooting on Saturday evening in the Malgobek district in the north of the region. The neighborhood police officer died after several assailants shot him with automatic rifles late Saturday.
Yevkurov speculated that the initial shooting of the policeman was intended to be followed by the suicide bombing at the funeral. He said, "Based on the information we have, the armed attack at night on the neighbourhood police officer, who died from wounds in hospital, was specially planned so as to arrange a terrorist attack at the funeral."
The blast came hours after masked gunmen opened fire in a mosque in Dagestan on Saturday as worshippers celebrated the end of Ramadan, injuring eight and leaving an explosive device that was later deactivated.
#1
As times before, the GWOT is as much an INTER-MUSLIM, etc. IDEO + MILPOL/GEOPOL STRUGGLE AS IT IS US-VS-RADICAL-ISLAM for 9-11.
IMO the Saudis recognize that their control of the Islamic "holy places" + dogmatic interpretationism , now also as per desired OWG "Caliphate", is being challenged from within Islam itself, + NOT JUST BY SHIA ISLAM I.E. IRAN.
IT BEHOOVES THE SAUDIS TO MAKE RAPPROCHEMENT + PEACE WID AMBITIOUS IRAN, ETAL, AMAP ALAP AS THE FORMER MUST PREPARE TO DEFEND ITS HISTORICAL POSITION + AUTHORITY IN THE ARAB-MUSLIM UNIVERSE.
At least six breakaway Muslim terrorists rebels were killed in new fighting last night in Maguindanao.
Col. Prudencio Asto said the clash broke out after elements of the Bangsamoro Islamic Freedom Fighters (BIFF) harassed a military detachment in the town of Guindulungan in Maguindanao on Friday. A gun battle ensued, killing six on the enemy side.
The military also said BIFF terrorists rebels behind a series of recent attacks on military detachments in Maguindanao last week are being coddled by their former colleagues in the Moro Islamic Liberation Front (MILF). Asto said, "Some of the members of BIFF men have relatives in the MILF. Blood is thicker than water. We know that some are now hiding in the camps of the MILF."
Mohaqher Iqbal, chief negotiator for the MILF, said he could neither confirm or deny the military's pronouncement as majority of BIFF members have relatives in their organization. He said, "We are calling on BIFF who were not involved in the recent fighting...our doors are still open. They can go back to us anytime."
ALL 31 people including an "official delegation" to Sudan's war-torn South Kordofan state have been killed after their plane crashed. The crash on Sunday followed an explosion aboard the plane which was carrying the officials to a function marking the Muslim Eid holiday."All people on board were killed," Abdelhafiz Abdelrahim, a spokesman for the Sudan Aviation Authority, told AFP. He said the plane was landing in Talodi town at about 8am (1500 AEST) when "an explosion was heard and the plane was destroyed".
Abdelrahim could not immediately provide further details. The official SUNA news agency issued a brief alert which said only: "A plane with 26 passengers, including ministers, crashed near Talodi." Talodi has been a key battleground in the war which began in June last year between the government and ethnic rebels of the Sudan People's Liberation Movement-North (SPLM-N). There was no immediate word on what caused the explosion. Looks like it was shot down, presumably by a SAM.
The US launched the second drone strike in the past 24 hour in an area known as a terrorist haven in the Taliban-controlled tribal agency of North Waziristan.
The remotely piloted Predators or the more advanced Reapers fired several missiles at a vehicle in the Mana area in the Shawal Valley in North Waziristan, according to AFP and Geo News. Five drones were seen circling over the attack site before and after the strike.
Pakistani officials said that between four and six "militants" were killed in the strike, but did not disclose their identities. No senior al Qaeda or Taliban leaders were reported killed.
The strike is the second in Shawal in the past 24 hours. On Saturday, the drones hit a compound in the village of Shuwedar in the Shawal Valley in North Waziristan, killing six more "militants," according to Pakistani officials. Pakistan's Foreign Ministry objected to the earlier strike in Shawal, and called the US incursions "a violation of its sovereignty and territorial integrity and also in contravention of international law," according to Dawn.
[Jerusalem Post] Two kabooms struck the Libyan capital of Tripoli ...a confusing city, one end of thich is located in Lebanon and the other end of which is the capital of Libya. Its chief distinction is being mentioned in the Marine Hymn... on Sunday, Al-Arabiya television reported, citing its correspondent.
The Arabic satellite channel said there were deaths and injuries but did not give numbers. It said one of the blasts struck near the interior ministry and another in Omar Mukhtar Street, without giving further details of what caused the blasts.
The report could not immediately be independently confirmed.
[Jerusalem Post] The son of late Libyan dictator Muammar Qadaffy ... one of those little rainstorms from the Arab Spring... , Saif al-Islam Qadaffy,
He's the one with the PhD from the London School of Economics whose dissertation was written for him by several generous Harvard econ. professors or perhaps the Monitor Group, but at any rate not by his own dear little hand...
will go on trial in Libya next month for the charge of urging supporters to kill demonstrators and rebels during last year's uprising in the country, The Telegraph reported on Saturday.
Saif al-Islam Qadaffy will face execution by hanging if he is found guilty, according to the report.
Assuming they let him live long enough to be hanged...
Qadaffy will be tried in Libya and the International Criminal Court ... where Milosevich died of old age before being convicted ... at The Hague will play no role in the trial, The Telegraph reported.
[Jerusalem Post] The Islamic Awakening Party announced on Saturday that its offices in northern Tunisia had been set ablaze, Paleostinian daily Al-Quds reported.
The Islamist party, which is the ruling party of Tunisia following the ouster of Zine El Abidine Ben Ali as part of the Arab Spring, declared that its local headquarters in Makthar had been completely destroyed by the fire.
The announcement went on to point fingers at "radical left-wing parties and other organizations" for the damage and demanded that authorities investigate the crime and prosecute the guilty parties.
[Jerusalem Post] Czech police incarcerated ... anything you say can and will be used against you, whether you say it or not... a man they say is an admirer of Norwegian mass murderer Anders Behring Breivik, and seized an arsenal of weapons in the man's possession, CNN reported Saturday.
Breivik, a far-right bully boy opposed to Mohammedan immigration to Europe, confessed to killing 77 people last year in a bombing and shooting spree in which he targeted a government building in Oslo and a Norwegian Labor Party youth camp. He is on trial with court authorities yet to determine whether or not he will be deemed insane.
Czeck police confiscated firearms, ammunition and explosive detonators from the suspects' apartment, as well as police uniforms and equipment. He may have been planning to disguise himself as a police officer while carrying out an attack, CNN quoted police as saying. Breivik wore a police uniform during his shooting spree at the youth camp on Norway's Utoeya island northwest of Oslo.
The Czech suspect had indicated in emails that he was an admirer of Breivik, according to police. Breivik told authorities last year that he was part of a wider network working against multiculturalism in Europe, a claim that Norwegian authorities said was likely untrue.
[Jerusalem Post] Storied Baghdad ...located along the Tigris River, founded in the 8th century, home of the Abbasid Caliphate... officials, some with close ties to Iraqi PM Maliki, using a network of financial institutions and oil-smuggling operations that are providing Tehran with a crucial flow of dollars, 'New York Times ...which still proudly displays Walter Duranty's Pulitzer prize... ' reports.
Iraq has been helping Iran skirt economic sanctions imposed because of its nuclear program, using a network of financial institutions and oil-smuggling operations that are providing Tehran with a crucial flow of dollars, The New York Times reported on Saturday.
In some cases, Iraqi government officials are turning a blind eye to trade with Iran, while other officials in Storied Baghdad are directly profiting from the activities -- with several of them having close ties to Iraqi Prime Minister Nuri Kamal al-Maliki, the Times said.
US President Barack Obama The campaign's over, John... acknowledged the problem last month when he barred a small Iraqi bank, the Elaf Islamic Bank, from any dealings with the American banking system, the newspaper said.
At the time, the president said that the bank had "facilitated transactions worth millions of dollars on behalf of Iranian banks that are subject to sanctions for their links to Iran's illicit proliferation activities."
And yet Iraqi banking experts told the Times that Elaf Islamic Bank was still participating in the Iraq Central Bank's daily auction at which commercial banks can sell Iraqi dinars and buy dollars. Through these auctions, Iran is able to bolster its reserve of dollars that are used to pay for much-needed imports.
The Times, citing sources in the B.O. regime, current and former American and Iraqi officials and banking and oil experts, said Washington has privately complained to Iraqi officials about financial and logistical ties between Storied Baghdad and Tehran.
In one recent instance, when Obama learned that the Iraqi government was aiding the Iranians by allowing them to use Iraqi airspace to ferry supplies to Syria, he called Maliki to complain, and Iranian planes then flew another route, the Times said.
Iranian organizations apparently have gained control over at least four Iraqi commercial banks through Iraqi intermediaries, which would gives Iran direct access to the international financial system, from which they are barred by the economic sanctions, the Times said.
The problem with illegal Iraq-Iran trade has become well-enough known in Storied Baghdad that it has roiled Iraqi politics, the newspaper said.
"We want to question the central bank and the banks that are involved," Ali al-Sachri, a member of Parliament, told the Times. He said he was concerned that the huge dollar transfers threatened the economic stability of Iraq by depleting the country's foreign reserves.
Iran's ability to trade and the incoming flow of dollars is crucial to the country because the economic sanctions imposed by the United Nations ...what started out as a a diplomatic initiative, now trying to edge its way into legislative, judicial, and executive areas... and individual countries are squeezing its economy, the paper said.
#2
Gee, remember all the D.C. foreign policy establishment eggheads who told us that we "want" a strong relationship between Iraq and Iran and that it's "healthy" for the region? That's why we "had" to bring Iran in for the regional talks on Iraq.
But when we start seeing the results of Iran and Iraq's cooperation, we don't like it.
Posted by: American Delight ||
08/19/2012 8:24
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#4
I thought the Author had died.
Glad it's not true.
Posted by: Redneck Jim ||
08/19/2012 11:28
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#5
Fred is on a business trip, Redneck Jim. My apologies that you were worried, as I was the one who thought people wouldn't. This is badanov's first go at it.
Posted by: Rambler in Virginia ||
08/19/2012 12:25
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#7
Thanks! I have been missing my morning paper....
Posted by: 49 pan ||
08/19/2012 13:09
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#8
I missed it also, but didn't really know how to comment about it. Now that it is back, I can say in this thread that it is one of the first things I read every day to be sure I am catching at least a mention of the important stories for the day.
Feverish media speculation about an attack on Iran has penetrated Israelis' highly developed shell of apathy. But they're lining up for protective kits without undue stress -- like Americans doing the Christmas shopping early
Three Egyptian coppers and a soldier were maimed near the Sinai town of Sheikh Zuwaid on Saturday when gunnies fired a rocket-propelled grenade at their convoy during an operation against forces of Evil following the killing of 16 border guards.
The attack took place while the police were on their way back to the city of al-Arish after arresting two suspects at the border town of Rafah, a security source said. They could not identify or pursue the attackers, he added.
New York City must be one of the places where old hippies go to die. Hat tip to The Other Perfesser
Alt-weeklies are always dying. But the news Friday that four editorial staffers were laid off or had their hours cut to part-time at The Village Voice -- two features writers, a news blogger and a listings editor -- makes the sad fact of that paper's eventual demise, evident for years, more immediate. The paper now has one news blogger, two features writers, a music editor, a few people working on listings and one critic, aided by a couple contributors, writing about food.
The layoffs at the Voice weren't the only ones: papers across the Village Voice Media company, which owns more or less every notable alternative weekly nowadays, experienced layoffs, I've learned, including those in Minneapolis, Phoenix, Los Angeles, San Francisco, Dallas, and Broward-Palm Beach. The Voice itself is planning to move out of its iconic East Village office space in the near future, as I and other staff members found out last year. There have been many ends of an era for a paper that always prided itself at being on the vanguard, but this one seems permanent and final: "I can't imagine how much leaner they can get," said a friend of mine who was recently let go from the Dallas Observer. More at the link
CAIRO: An Egyptian court has ordered a popular TV presenter and a chief editor of an independent daily to face trial for insulting the country's newly elected president. The Cairo court charged controversial TV presenter Tawfiq Okasha with suggesting the killing of President Muhammad Mursi during his nightly TV show. The court also referred the chief editor of El-Dustour daily, Islam Afifi, for his newspaper's harsh criticism of Mursi.
Meet the new boss, same as the old boss...
Court referrals escalate the unfolding standoff between Egypt's president and his opponents in the media.
Last week, members of the upper house of Parliament chose new editors for state-owned newspapers despite demands for a vote by newspaper staff or an independent media body. Around half the seats in the upper house of Parliament are controlled by Mursi's Muslim Brotherhood group. The editors were appointed by members of the upper house, in the same manner as under former President Hosni Mubarak, prompting the Egyptian Journalist's Syndicate to condemn the selection process. Hundreds of journalists came out to the streets to protest.
Meanwhile, Okasha's network El-Faraeen, or the Pharaohs, was ordered off the air after he warned Mursi not to attend the funeral of 16 Egyptian soldiers killed in a militant attack this month in Egypt's Sinai Peninsula. He said the "spilling" of Mursi's blood would be permissible and alleged the Brotherhood was behind the attack close to the border with Israel.
Okasha is popular both for his scathing criticism of the Brotherhood and also of the youth groups and activists behind last year's uprising that toppled Mubarak. Okasha was a member of Mubarak's ruling party before it was dissolved.
Nearly a month after he was sworn-in, Mursi met with media chiefs and promised there would be no restrictions on press freedoms. Under Mubarak, reporters were jailed and fined for writing about his health, for example. Mursi's spokesman Yasser Ali told reporters later Thursday that the president had nothing to do with the court's decision on the two media figures and that he continues to support press freedoms.
Yasser's lips then fell off and flapped on the floor. Mursi could stop all this with one public statement, but he hasn't. And won't.
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BEIRUT: Lebanese group Hezbollah will transform the lives of Israelis to hell if Israel attacks Lebanon, its leader said yesterday, adding that the group would not hesitate to hit targets that would leave tens of thousands of Israelis dead. Speaking in a televised speech marking Jerusalem Day an annual rally in support of the Palestinians Sheikh Hassan Nasrallah said only a few rockets fired by the groups militia could cause massive casualties, given its well-planned target list.
Was the speech televised at the rally as well? Nasty usually won't show his own shadow outdoors...
Rockets are ready and directed at these targets, he said. We will not hesitate to use them, if we have to, at any point in time in the course of aggression against our country to protect our people, he added.
Hezbollah cannot destroy Israel but we can transform the lives of millions of Zionists in occupied Palestine into a real hell, the cowardly black-turbaned Nasrallah said. We can change the face of Israel.
Nasrallah said Irans response to any Israeli attack would be lightning quick and great.
It would be the golden opportunity Iran has been dreaming of for 32 years, he said, referring to the date of Irans 1979 Revolution. He did not mention what an attack on Iran would mean for Hezbollah.
Why, the end of Hezbollah of course...
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A sad reminder that this kind of thing happens all over, not just in America. The odds are about 50% that the perpetrator is one of the 5-10% of the mentally ill who become violent.
Eight people were stabbed or cut by a man wielding a box-cutter Saturday at a subway station just outside of South Korea's capital, police said.
No one died in the 10-minute rampage and the injuries weren't life-threatening, according to three coppers who spoke on condition of anonymity because they weren't authorized to talk to the media. A man was tossed in the calaboose Drop the gat, Rocky, or you're a dead 'un! running away from the station in Uijeongbu, which is home to US and South Korean military bases, the officers said.
In the ornate setting of Warsaw's royal castle Patriarch Kirill, head of Russia's Orthodox Church, and Archbishop Jozef Michalik called for forgiveness and understanding. The memorandum has already been likened to a historic 1965 letter on forgiveness from Polish bishops to their German counterparts that paved the way for a new era of relations between Poland and Germany after the horrors of the Second World War.
Poland's close friendship with Germany now stands in marked contrast with Warsaw's relations with Moscow, which are still dogged by mistrust and a widespread feeling in Poland that Russia has done too little to atone for historical wrongs inflicted on the Poles. Russia's apparent inability to come completely clean and show true regret over the 1940 massacre of thousands of Poles at the hands of Stalin's secret police in the Katyn forests, and the imposition of communist rule after the war still rankles Poland, and colours relations between the two countries.
In response Moscow has long complained that a Polish obsession with history gets in the way of good relations, and interferes with Russia's relations with the West as a whole.
(CNN) -- Ten Yemeni hard boyz infiltrated Egyptian soil two months ago and trained local Jihadi cells in the Sinai peninsula, a security official said Friday.
"Several foreign men were spotted shopping in the market by residents and we received intelligence that they were in communication with Jihadist cells in Al Mukataa, a remote area south of Sheikh Zuweid in Northern Sinai," said a security bigshot associated with Egypt's North Sinai's border guards, who spoke on condition of anonymity. "We hope to capture them in our ongoing raids. They could be hiding in Jabal-Al Halal -- a rugged mountain terrain in central Sinai."
The Yemeni hard boyz were smuggled into Sinai from Sudan among groups of African migrants who have been sold to Bedouin who traffic refugees into Israel for cash, said Ibrahim Al Menei, a Bedouin leader from the Swarkeh tribe who has spearheaded a committee of hundreds of men to curb the illegal trafficking of Africans through the Sinai.
"Word spread among the community that these Yemeni hard boyz were training Jihadi cells in Sheikh Zuweid. The intelligence officers were aware of their presence," Menei told CNN.
Five soldiers were injured in a grenade attack on an Army base in Pattani province late on Friday night. Police said the attackers fired M79 grenades at the Army base located on Pattani-Yala Road in Yarang district.
In related news, the president of a local administrative organisation in the same province was gunned down right after he and his daughter arrived home early yesterday morning in Nong Chik district. Mahama Pula, 43, was killed with a .38 caliber weapon after he parked his car and was about to take his 6-year-old daughter out of the car.
In Yala's Muang district, two unidentified teenagers were severely wounded by shots fired from an M16 rifle in a drive-by shooting yesterday while returning from a mosque.
ADEN, Yemen: Suspected Al-Qaeda militants killed 14 soldiers in a rocket attack and suicide bombing on Saturday that targeted intelligence headquarters in the main southern city of Aden, a security official said.
The death toll has increased to 14 soldiers, the official told AFP, adding that 11 were killed by gunfire and the other three by a car bomb driven by suicide bomber into the courtyard of the intelligence building.
The attack is the work of Al-Qaeda elements, he said. The same official had said earlier that masked gunmen used machine guns and rocket-propelled grenades in the attack in the Tawahi coastal neighborhood of Aden.
The militants attacked in two groups, with one targeting the south side of the complex, and the other attacking the west side, next to the adjacent state television building.
Eleven soldiers were killed at the television gate, while three others were killed by the car bomb, the official said. He said that many of the soldiers were sleeping when the militants hurled hand grenades into their room.
Four soldiers were wounded, and three television employees, including two women, were also wounded, he said. The militants managed to escape.
Witnesses said they saw two armored vehicles on fire at the gate of the television offices.
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KABUL: Two Afghan security personnel opened fire on Western colleagues yesterday, killing two US soldiers and causing a number of other casualties in two separate attacks, the military said.
US concern is mounting of the unprecedented number of such "green-on-blue" attacks, which have now killed 39 international troops in 29 such incidents so far this year, according to NATO figures. Yesterday's attacks will further erode trust between foreign troops and the Afghans they work with, a week after six American troops were killed in a single day by their local colleagues.
The two Americans were killed in western Farah province, NATO's US-led International Security Assistance Force (ISAF) said.
"A member of the Afghan Local Police turned his weapon against two USFOR-A service members. The attacker was shot and killed."
Just hours later, ISAF confirmed that "a number" of foreign and Afghan soldiers were shot and wounded by an Afghan soldier in the southern province of Kandahar.
"The attacker was shot and later died of his wounds in the hospital," a spokesman said, without providing any further details. Local officials said two Americans and one Afghan soldier were wounded.
US Defense Secretary Leon Panetta said Tuesday he was "very concerned" about the attacks and the impact they are having on cooperation with Afghan allies.
The Taleban's reclusive supreme leader, Mullah Omar, has boasted that the attacks are the result of a deliberate plan by the militants to sow distrust between foreign and Afghan troops.
NATO says most of the incidents are motivated by cultural differences between troops and plays down the role of Taleban infiltration.
"What we identified was that most of them were caused by personal grievances and stress situations," the chief spokesman for ISAF, Brig. Gen. Gunter Katz, told AFP.
"We are confident that the morale (among international troops) is still good and those incidents will not affect our transition process," he said.
Panetta said Gen. John Allen, who heads the international coalition force in Afghanistan, was meeting Afghan security ministers and village elders to discuss further steps to protect against such attacks. These measures include increasing the intelligence presence to get better information about potential attacks, he said.
NATO had already this year started a so-called guardian angel program in which one soldier watches the backs of others as they work with Afghan forces, but it has not prevented a spike in attacks.
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#1
Small wars covered it fast.
"Terry Walker, a former Marine trainer in Helmand Province, told Fox News that most of these incidents are due to personal and cultural conflicts. He said Afghans simply have a different way of dealing with their problems.
"You have a strong influence that's tribal," Walker said. "Afghans can't be insulted and they have no conflict resolution capability. The smallest thing can set them off."
#3
Taliban 'infiltration' of Afghan Security Forces, Army, Police, etc, is a strategy recently directed by the Quetta Shura. It is a simple asymmetrical, divisionary tactic.
Consider if you will, if the Afghans are driven into homicidal rages by slight or insult, why is it just now kicking in?
#7
#6 Infiltration is a piece of cake for Islamic Jihad. Another word for it is multi-culturalism. Posted by Albemarle Fillmore4978
Paul Gottfied writes that where "deformed Protestant culture exists, so does the politics of guilt"....."spiraling confessing to and compensating for historical burdens". The birthing and feeding of multiculturalism paralled by endless self-loathing and apologies.
ISLAMABAD: A missile launched from a US drone struck a suspected militant hideout in a tribal region in northern Pakistan where allies of a powerful warlord were gathered Saturday, killing five of his supporters, Pakistani officials said.
The strike in North Waziristan against allies of Hafiz Gul Bahadur, a militant commander whose forces frequently target US and other NATO troops in neighboring Afghanistan, comes amid speculation over whether Pakistan will launch an operation against militants in the tribal region.
Pakistans foreign ministry condemned the latest drone attack. Pakistan has consistently maintained that these attacks are a violation of its sovereignty and territorial integrity, and are in contravention of international law, the ministry said in a statement.
Some Uzbek foreign fighters were among the dead in Saturdays strike, according to two Pakistan intelligence officials. Three people were also wounded, they said.
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AMMAN -- Despite the imminent departure of the observers, the UN announced that veteran Algerian diplomat Lakhdar Brahimi will take over as international envoy from Kofi Annan, who quit earlier this month. Brahimi, who hesitated for days to accept a job that Frances UN envoy Gerard Araud called an impossible mission, will have a new title, Joint Special Representative for Syria. Diplomats said the change was to distance himself from Kofi Annan.
UN aid agencies said Syrians are pouring across the borders to escape fighting in their homeland and diarrheal disease has broken out in rural areas near Damascus. More than 170,000 Syrians have been registered in Iraq, Jordan, Lebanon and Turkey, the UN refugee agency said.
Some 3,500 Syrians fleeing Aleppo, Azaz, Idlib and Latakia reached Turkeys Hatay and Kilis provinces between Tuesday and Wednesday, spokesman Adrian Edwards of the UN High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) said.
There has been a further sharp rise in the number of Syrians fleeing to Turkey, Edwards said. There are now almost 65,000 Syrians in nine camps in Turkey, though not all yet formally registered. To put this in perspective, about 40 percent arrived in August.
Some 1.2 million people are uprooted within the country, many staying in schools or other public buildings, UNHCR said.
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Malik Riaz in power corridors
Writing in Jang Hamid Mir stated that Zardari and Gilani replaced Musharraf's dictatorship but followed his policies. Musharraf's close associates encircled them. Malik Riaz the real estate tycoon wrote a column in his own newspaper praising Musharraf for dismissing Chief Justice Iftikhar Chaudhry. The article was actually written by a senior journalist for him. In return he got contracts from Musharraf. The Q League leaders also became close through their sons while an Imran Khan ... aka Taliban Khan, who ain't the sharpest bulb on the national tree... companion was employed by Malik Riaz as his lawyer with an eye to the future. When the Chief Justice got after Gilani, Gilani should have resigned but Malik Riaz told him not to because he was going to get the Chief Justice to resign instead. After that he bought many who had not sold out to Musharraf.
'Aitzaz is not my hero!'
Columnist Hamid Mir wrote in Jang that he was once devoted to Barrister Aitzaz Ahsan and had quarrelled with many people while defending him but when in the Court Aitzaz heard attorney general Irfan Qadir insulting the Court he did nothing in reaction. At that point Mir decided he was no longer his hero. He did not defend Gilani competently and he doesn't agree with people who say the trial was a foregone conclusion even had Aitzaz tried.
Gilani, the longest PM?
Daily Jang had Hamid Mir opine that PM Yousaf Raza Gilani was said to be history's strongest prime minister of Pakistain but he got rid of five finance ministers in four years while removing six finance secretaries. Had he been transparent in governance he would have steered clear of the likes of Malik Riaz.
To the columnist of 'kaptaan'
PMLN leader Senator Pervez Rasheed wrote in Jang directed his rejoinder to columnist Haroon Rasheed without naming him, calling him kaptaan ka kaalam nigar. Imran Khan said Malik Riaz should lift the Koran and tell whom all he had paid off. Upon which Ch Nisar Ali Khan of PMLN had said Malik Riaz should also say how much he financed the PTI marches from Rawalpindi to Lahore. The style of the kaalam nigar was that he quoted the Koran followed by Hadith and then referred to his and Khan Sahib's joint saint. While he eulogised Imran Khan he constantly ran down the PMLN.
Imran Khan's lies
PMLN leader Senator Pervez Rasheed wrote in Jang that Imran Khan applied in writing to Chief Minister Punjab Nawaz Sharif ... served two non-consecutive terms as prime minister, heads the Pakistain Moslem League (Nawaz). Noted for his spectacular corruption, the 1998 Pak nuclear test, border war with India, and for being tossed by General Musharraf... in 1987 saying he had no personal house and be given a plot from CM's discretionary quota of plots. He was given one in Faisal Town's posh locality. Later he stated that he had won it as prize from Punjab government after defeating India.
Nawaz Sharif businessman, not politician!
Deserting politician and new Tehrik Insaf leader Javed Hashmi told Jang that Nawaz Sharif was a big businessman but not a big politicians whereas Imran Khan was a big cricketer but a much bigger politician. He said he had never said that he would live and die for the PMLN.
Imran Khan's bloggers run wild
Writing in Express Nusrat Javeed stated that the lovers of Imran Khan were running wild at the internet attacking and defaming media persons who they thought were bought up by Zardari or Nawaz Sharif. The party will advance to new destinations only after it is done with blackening the faces of mediamen.
'I am not sitting at Zardari's feet!'
Quoted by Express former president of Supreme Court Bar and human rights ...which often intentionally defined so widely as to be meaningless... lawyer Asma Jahangir stated that she was not sitting at the feet of Zardari but Hamid Khan of Tehrik Insaf was seen sitting next (baghal mein) to Imran Khan. She said it was difficult today to criticise the Army and the Judiciary but she was doing it. She was not involved in promoting her friends as judges but the faction of Hamid Khan was busy doing it.
Staring at judge, go to jail!
Reported in Express the Islamabad High Court sent an officer of the CDA to jail for a strange offence. The DG Planning was standing in front of the judge and staring at him. On which the judge stated that bureaucrats had become Pharaohs and were threatening the courts. The officer was set to sit in solemn silence in a dull, dark dock, in a pestilential prison with a life-long lock I ain't sayin' nuttin' widdout me mout'piece! and sent to Adiala Jail.
Railways, ours and India's
Reported in Jang Pakistain Railways had only 100 locomotives out of which only 85 were on track pulling passenger trains. It has 430 locomotives out which 46 can be brought on track after small repairs. Forty years ago Pakistain ran 360 trains but in 2012 it was running only 85 passenger trains and there were no freight trains running. In India, the railways was running 9,000 trains daily with an average of 25 bogies. India had 8,000 locomotives.
Sheikh Rasheed in America
Columnist Nazeer Naji wrote in Jang that Sheikh Rasheed should not have been surprised when he was tossed in the clink Keep yer hands where we can see 'em, if yez please! at an airport for five hours when he visited the US. Sheikh Rasheed has been on record once that he was involved in training youths for Indian administered Kashmire in a jihadi camp. India had labelled the Kashmire freedom fighter as Orcs and similar vermin and now America too was calling them the same.
Peace with India, with honour!
Columnist Hamid Mir wrote in Jang that peace with India was okay but it should be achieved with honour and those Indian agents convicted of terrorism in Pakistain should not be released for the sake of peace with India. He referred to fellow journalist Ansar Abbasi who opposed the release of an Indian agent from Pak jail. An Indian TV anchor criticised Hamid Mir for scaring Zardari off from releasing an Indian prisoner.
Can media lampoon Army and Judiciary?
Quoted in Express federal information minister Qamar Zaman Kaira stated that if the media was so brave it should also criticise the Army and the Judiciary. It was easy to make fun of national politicians but it took real moral courage to make cartoons of the Army chief and the Chief Justice and some Orcs and similar vermin hiding in some parts of the country.
Hamid Khan should return the fee!
Owned by Malik Riaz daily Jinnah said on the front page that lawyer Hamid Khan can get his licence to practise annulled if he doesn't return the fee collected by him from Malik Riaz after joining Tehrik Insaf and refusing to represent him. It was against the law to first take the fee and then refuse to represent a client without returning the received fee.
Chechnya and Timor compared
Writing in Jang Nazeer Naji stated that East Timor in Indonesia was awarded independence because the Christians living there could create their own country. But the Chechen Mohammedans struggling against Russia for their independence were not given the same right because no Mohammedan country was supporting their movement.
Crush the Qadianis!
World famous leader of Mohammedans Pir Azharul Hassan Gilani told Jinnah that the 'guru' of the Qadianis had toured America and got a lot of support there which proved that he was busy concocting conspiracies against Pakistain and the world of Islam. He said he would fight the Qadianis on every front.
BEIRUT: Syria denied reports on Saturday that President Bashar Assads deputy had defected and his forces pressed an offensive against rebels, bombarding parts of Aleppo in the north and hitting an insurgent-held town in the oil-producing east.
Vice President Farouq Al-Shara never thought for a moment about leaving the country, said a statement from his office broadcast on state television issued in response to reports that the veteran Baath Party loyalist had tried to defect to Jordan.
But a former Syrian minister who defected last March said it was well-known that Shara had tried to leave and was under house arrest.
Sharas position is well known. He has been trying to leave Syria, former deputy oil minister Abdo Hussameddin told pan-Arab television Al-Arabiya.
But there are a series of circumstances that prevent him from leaving, especially the fact that he has been under house arrest for some time, he said, adding that top level officials in Syria were being kept under surveillance.
Shara, whose cousin an intelligence officer announced his own defection on Thursday, is a Sunni Muslim from Daraa province where the revolt first erupted against Assad, from the minority Alawite sect. The 73-year-old former foreign minister kept a low profile as the rebellion escalated but appeared in public last month at a state funeral for three of Assads top security officials killed in a bomb attack in Damascus.
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#1
Operation Ass Wipe up date- tidy bowl man has taken rounds- toilet brushes are running low- bed pans gone from hospitals and all duck tape is missing from store shelves> Johnny on the spot thefts have increased 10 fold and their are now blue colored insurgents running amok in the streets! Out of TP and dimes please advise we are pinned down in a public restroom and these bastards only wipe with one hand!
JERUSALEM: A Palestinian man was in serious condition after a petrol bomb hit the taxi he was traveling in near a Jewish settlement in the Bethlehem region of the West Bank, hospital officials said yesterday.
Six Palestinians from the same family, residents of Nahalin village, were on Thursday evening heading to a nearby supermarket when their vehicle painted bright yellow, marking it as a Palestinian taxi was hit by the firebomb. The father of the family, sitting next to the driver, was stuck in the car that flipped over into a ditch after the attack and suffered burns to the face and body, officials at Hadassah Ein Kerem hospital in Jerusalem said.
Nahalins mayor told AFP the taxi driver had told him he saw the perpetrator, who was a Jewish settler.
Couldn't possibly have been a Paleo from another faction, as no brother Arab would ever attack another...
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The last UN observers who deployed in Syria four months ago to monitor Annan's failed cease-fire will leave after midnight on Sunday, when their mandate expires. They will leave a "liaison office" open in Damascus after their departure, though its size and role have not been finalized, a UN spokeswoman said.
"The comfort for me is that the UN will stay in the country," General Babacar Gaye, head of the departing UN Supervision Mission in Syria, told reporters in Damascus. "The United Nations is committed to ending violence, committed to triggering dialogue between the parties."
Brahimi, a Nobel Peace laureate,
Given the others who've been given that, it's a wonder the gentleman admits to it...
will have a new title, Joint Special Representative for Syria. Diplomats said the change was to distance him from Annan, who had complained that his Syria peace plan was hampered by a divided Security Council.
In an interview with France 24 television, Brahimi said he would soon meet with the Security Council.
"We are going to discuss very seriously how they can help," he said. "They are asking me to do this job. If they don't support me, there is no job. They are divided, but surely they can unite on something like this and I hope they will."
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Handled by National Security Adviser Tom Donilon for the US president and senior adviser Ron Dermer for the prime minister, they focus essentially on a four-point plan embodying Israel's requirements for delaying an attack.
1. President Obama will formally inform the two houses of congress in writing that he plans to use military force to prevent Iran from arming itself with a nuclear weapon. He will request their endorsement. Aside from this step's powerful deterrent weight for persuading Iran's leaders to give up their pursuit of a nuclear bomb, it would also give the US president the freedom to go to war with Iran when he sees fit, without have to seek congressional endorsement.
The problem being that the our beloved president will never see fit to go to war with Iran.
2. To underscore his commitment, President Obama would pay a visit to Israel in the weeks leading up to election-day and deliver a speech to the Knesset solemnly pledging to use American military force against the Islamic Republic if Tehran still refuses to give up its nuclear weapon program. He will repeat that pledge before various other public forums.
3, In the coming months up until Spring 2013, the United States will upgrade Israel's military, intelligence and technological capabilities so that if President Obama (whether he is reelected or replaced by Mitt Romney) decides to back out of this commitment, Israel will by then be in command of the resources necessary for inflicting mortal damage on Iran's nuclear program with a unilateral strike.
debkafile's military sources note that an influx of these top-grade US military resources would bridge the gap between American and Israeli ticking clocks for an attack on Iran, and dispel the fear in Jerusalem that delay would give Iran time to bury its key facilities in "zones of immunity" - outside Israel's reach for serious damage with its present capabilities.
Sure. Jam yesterday and jam tomorrow, but never jam today.
4. If points 1-3 can be covered -- and Netanyahu and Barak are convinced the US really means to strike Iran next spring - our Washington and Jerusalem sources report that Jerusalem may be coming around to agreeing to hold back a lone Israeli attack this autumn.
One hopes this means the Israelis have information that Iran's nuclear work has again been slowed, but one suspects they are now pinning their plans on a Mitt Romney win in November.
Those sources report that President Obama has not rejected the plan.
Another way of saying he has not agreed to it....
Donilon was told to keep on talking to Netanyahu and Barak.
Posted by: Water Modem ||
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Of course being a double dealer himself, the One would ponder "what if I agree to all this, and the [expletives] still attack before election day?". It's not like he's ever played Chicago politics to consider such an scenario.
#3
The problem is, Obama is known for his weakness against Iran. Both Israel and Iran know this. If this is true, then some extra diplomatic pressure might be helpful, but everyone just might ignore it too.
#4
Evidence that this is BS found with the Tom Donilon lead, and the excerpt below:
1. President Obama will formally inform the two houses of congress in writing that he plans to use military force to prevent Iran from arming itself with a nuclear weapon.
#8
Israel has asked Egypt to withdraw its Armor, i.e. Main Battle Tanks + Mech/Infantry Fighting Vehicles, from the Sinai as these are in violation of the Sinai treaty.
The US = POTUS BAMMER may have a serious problem wid NOT-IRAN before October or espec the November elections iff Egypt refuses.
A multi-volume chronology and reference guide set detailing three years of the Mexican Drug War between 2010 and 2012.
Rantburg.com and borderlandbeat.com correspondent and author Chris Covert presents his first non-fiction work detailing
the drug and gang related violence in Mexico.
Chris gives us Mexican press dispatches of drug and gang war violence
over three years, presented in a multi volume set intended to chronicle the death, violence and mayhem which has
dominated Mexico for six years.
Rantburg was assembled from recycled algorithms in the United States of America. No
trees were destroyed in the production of this weblog. We did hurt some, though. Sorry.
(
And while Romney is the present, Ryan is the future. Romneys fate will be determined on Nov. 6. Ryans presence, assuming he acquits himself well in the campaign, will extend for decades. If Ryan does it well, win or lose in 2012, he becomes a dominant national force. Mild and moderate Mitt Romney will have shaped the conservative future for years to come.
WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange is set to break months of silence Sunday from Ecuador's Embassy in Britain, where he fled to avoid extradition to Sweden.
The government on Saturday said the bulk SMSes and MMSes that triggered panic among the northeastern people had been traced to Pakistan and a protest would be lodged with Islamabad.
At least six breakaway Muslim 
The US launched the second drone strike in the past 24 hour in an area known as a terrorist haven in the Taliban-controlled tribal agency of North Waziristan.
[Jerusalem Post] Two 
[Jerusalem Post] The son of late Libyan dictator 
[Jerusalem Post] Czech police 
BEIRUT: Lebanese group Hezbollah will transform the lives of Israelis to hell if Israel attacks Lebanon, its leader said yesterday, adding that the group would not hesitate to hit targets that would leave tens of thousands of Israelis dead. Speaking in a televised speech marking Jerusalem Day an annual rally in support of the Palestinians Sheikh Hassan Nasrallah said only a few rockets fired by the groups militia could cause massive casualties, given its well-planned target list.
(CNN) -- Ten Yemeni 
KABUL: Two Afghan security personnel opened fire on Western colleagues yesterday, killing two US soldiers and causing a number of other casualties in two separate attacks, the military said.
ISLAMABAD: A missile launched from a US drone struck a suspected militant hideout in a tribal region in northern Pakistan where allies of a powerful warlord were gathered Saturday, killing five of his supporters, Pakistani officials said.
Malik Riaz in power corridors
Nawaz Sharif
Handled by National Security Adviser Tom Donilon for the US president and senior adviser Ron Dermer for the prime minister, they focus essentially on a four-point plan embodying Israel's requirements for delaying an attack.
